Want to eliminate uncertainty from the REO / foreclosure market and legal system? One simple SarbOX affidavit filed with the SEC will do it:

I hereby affirm that my staff (and I) have reviewed the current, pending and recently completed foreclosures. In no instances did we find any substantive errors, including: The wrong house being foreclosed upon; a mortgage note that was held by another bank (but not B of A) incorrectly used as a basis of a B of A foreclosure. Nor did we find that an incorrect house or person was foreclosed upon. Last, I affirm that no home without a mortgage was ever the subject of a foreclosure proceeding by B of A

_______________________________
Brian Moynihan, CEO
Bank of America

>

Bank of America is claiming that there were no mistakes made in foreclosures, despite widespread perjury, fraud, and omitted file and document reviews. I sincerely doubt that, given the Legal Impossibilities & Foreclosure Errors we have already discovered.

However, investors have been skittish as more and more of the Fraudclosure issue has been revealed.

The simple solution to this issue: Have Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan sign some variation of the attestation above, and submit that with the BofA Sarbanes Oxely filings.

This will put a lot of investors, Title Insurers, and REO Foreclosure buyers at ease.

Please use the comments to demonstrate your own ignorance, unfamiliarity with empirical data and lack of respect for scientific knowledge. Be sure to create straw men and argue against things I have neither said nor implied. If you could repeat previously discredited memes or steer the conversation into irrelevant, off topic discussions, it would be appreciated. Lastly, kindly forgo all civility in your discourse . . . you are, after all, anonymous.

How ironic…here’s a Wal-Mart ad touting their employees. The actor says he got his first job at Wal-Mart, and was so good that a big bank offered him a job. Of course, Wal-Mart is such a wonderful place to work that he opted to stay!http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tazu4bMNXgw

Moynihan has that same crazy, certainty of purpose, look in his eye as ken lewis had when he plunged ahead w Countrywide etc.
These last two CEOs have nearly wrecked a relatively good bank
with formerly decent risk mgt and accounting

Accountability in the corporate world is for chumps, BR. Don’t you know that by now? The only way to survive in that environment is to SHIRK as much responsibility and accountability as one can. Parry, deflect, obfuscate, pass the buck. Repeat.

This absolves BAC of everything! No need to be signing pesky affidavits that might be used against BAC in court.

“Bank of America Corp. said it’s confident of its foreclosure decisions. The bank is still delaying foreclosures in the 27 states that don’t require a judge’s approval. It said it’s still reviewing its cases in those states.

The bank’s move comes two weeks after it began halting foreclosures nationwide amid allegations that bank employees signed but didn’t read documents that may have contained errors. These employees have earned the nickname “robo-signers.”

The company said it plans to resubmit documents with new signatures in the 23 states that require judicial authorization to restart the foreclosure process. It will delay fewer than 30,000 foreclosures.

“The basis for our foreclosure decisions is accurate,” Dan Frahm, a Bank of America spokesman, said in announcing the bank’s new approach”

Their basis is accurate, the bank is confident of it’s foreclosure decisions. What more reassurance that no foreclosures were invalid than this? Sheesh, isn’t a non-binding not under oath, press release from a spokesman good enough for all of you doubters?

“…In a letter Monday, a group of institutional bond investors raised objections to the handling of 115 bond deals issued by affiliates of Countrywide Financial Corp., acquired by Bank of America Corp. in 2008…”

Difficult to envision that the CEO of this company is going to swear (via a SarBox affadavit) that hundreds of thousands of foreclosures are absolutely perfect and would open himself up to criminal prosecution if .00005% of the process had an error.

In fact, I’m not sure any sane person would sign such a thing. Probably not a real shocker if he doesn’t take you up on this one.

At this point does anyone believe what any bank executive has to say? Under oath, or not? And by the same token, does anyone believe that any of these criminals will be prosecuted, much less stripped of their wealth?

Martha Stuart goes to jail, Mozzilo gets to keep the majority of his ill gotten gains, no jail time; the rest continue to make speeches protesting their company’s innocence and give campaign contributions.

But hey, it’s all the fault of those borrowers, banks threw due diligence out the window a long time ago.

This is a great thread. Wanted to add another, possibly simpler (maybe even low-brow) perspective. I am a lawman in CA and I was more intrigued with the actual false statements and notary public violations; here in CA these carry a $25K fine per offense. Now I am not sure how many of these “robo signatures” are for CA homes, but I would be very interested in some revenue here…I mean, if we’re on pace to do 1.2 million foreclosures this year – and say, 50% were in the “procedural error” bucket – this could be $15billion or so. Not bad. And you just know that some of these poor folks will roll on the bank execs – which brings you into the conspiracy area where you really don’t want to be.

Another aspect of all of this is providing false statements that are then relied upon by law enforcement. I came across this today which was pretty good: http://www.knowyourmortgagebanker.com/blog/blame-the-victim-or-the-perp (also – you can see how much these guys all make…CEO for B of A makes $17K per day!). I know that if some bank employee or their lawyer files false paperwork and I had to evict the wrong family or lock up the wrong house there would be hell to pay.

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About Barry Ritholtz

Ritholtz has been observing capital markets with a critical eye for 20 years. With a background in math & sciences and a law school degree, he is not your typical Wall St. persona. He left Law for Finance, working as a trader, researcher and strategist before graduating to asset managementRead More...

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